


Are you coming to the Hanging-Tree?

by karin6824



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, F/M, Hiatus, I don't like the ending I had planned, Mild Language, Work In Progress, don't know when I'll finish it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-01
Updated: 2014-10-13
Packaged: 2018-02-15 15:31:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2234181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karin6824/pseuds/karin6824
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the end of Mockingjay, Peeta returns to Twelve later than he did in the books.<br/>Katniss has to save herself from herself, having been left alone in Twelve, with Greasy Sae, a drunken Haymitch, annoying Buttercup and a house full of ghosts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my native language, so I'm sorry for any mistakes there might be.  
> Warning: This is kind of a depressing, angsty type of story, so... yeah.
> 
> Thank you for reading! :)
> 
>  
> 
> I do not own The Hunger Games.

Two months after the end of the war, Katniss wakes up from her dream, choking, drowning, being buried alive by the ashes of the dead. She throws her door open and runs outside of her house desperately. She stands still, taking deep breaths of fresh air, trying to calm down… Trying to figure out why the world is still spinning and she’s still here.

Being awake is slightly better than being asleep, because, if she tries hard enough, she can turn her mind off and pretend her demons don’t exist. But they do, and even though she sometimes manages to avoid them, they come back full force at night, when it’s dark and cold, the house empty and there no longer is the pair of arms that used to guard her from the nightmares. But that’s not a surprise, because everyone else is gone too, and she’s been left behind, supposedly alive. Despite the fact that she should be dead. She feels dead.

 

Greasy Sae arrives a while later, she isn’t sure how much. She doesn’t really care. But Greasy Sae does, and she beams at her when she sees her standing outside of her house.

The old woman takes her by the arm and walks her back inside the house and sits her at the kitchen table, as Katniss vaguely hears Greasy Sae talking about a new family who had arrived to the District in the last train and how their children had become friends with her granddaughter. She losses focus at some point of the story and is only aware that Greasy Sae is making something to eat. She doesn’t want to eat. She rarely feels hungry anymore.

After Greasy Sae puts whatever she made for lunch in the oven and sets the timer, she turns around and tells her is time for a bath. At first, Katniss doesn’t understand what she is telling her, not really having paid attention; when it sinks in, she still doesn’t know what Greasy Sae means, not having mentioned a bath ever before.

“I think it has been long enough, girl.” Katniss tries to think about the last time she bathed, but her memory fails her. Not that she really wants to remember either. “Let’s take you upstairs.”

Greasy Sae takes her by the arm once again and leads her to the second floor, but when they start walking down the hall to her room, she smells something weird and feels chills running down her spine. She only figures out where the smell is coming from when they enter her bedroom and by then it’s too late. Katniss sprints to the bathroom and barely gets to the toilet on time to throw up what little she had on her stomach. She feels tears streaming down her face, her body trembling, as she continues to dry heave. When she notices Greasy Sae behind her, holding her hair and rubbing her back to calm her down, she manages to stutter something resembling to ‘the rose’. But the older woman must understand what she said, because she gets up and goes back to the bedroom.

“WAIT!” Katniss screams in a lapse of panic. “Don’t touch it!” Somehow, she stands up and runs into the reeking room, reaching her nightstand first. She quickly grabs the vase that holds the flower and dashes for the window, barely taking her time to open it, before throwing the vase and the haunting flower out with all her strength.

Greasy Sae stares at her wide eyed, but Katniss just leaves the windows open, as she goes back inside the bathroom. She doesn’t bother with her clothes, just jumps inside the shower and lets the water soak her; hoping against hope that it washes everything away. But she still feels the stench on her skin. She takes her tattered clothes off and starts scrubbing furiously, willing the smell, the grime, the blood, the scars, the memories to go away. She just wants to go away.

When she finally gets out of the shower, she immediately goes to her bedroom, completely avoiding the mirror. She couldn’t bear to see herself. In her bed lay some clothes Greasy Sae must have left there for her. She puts them on mechanically, and combs and braids her hair as if it was something from another life. Another life where she wasn’t afraid to look at her scarred skin or feel her damaged short hair as she runs her fingers through it.

 

 

That’s the first time of more to come that she takes care of herself. Don’t get the wrong impression; it’s not like suddenly everything is okay and she moves on. Not at all. The next two days after that first one, she stays inside the closet, alongside with the coats and forgotten blankets she hides beneath. But somehow, she slowly manages. She takes one day at a time, never pushing things, in a snail like pace, but it works. She goes by in a robotic way, her mind turned off and her heart inexistent. At night, she still has nightmares, but she opens all the windows and it sometimes helps, deceiving her sleeping-self that she isn’t alone, because that is how _he_ liked to sleep. But only sometimes, because the other times it just makes it worse; emphasizing his absence when she wakes up and hears nothing more than the soft breeze and the eco of her screams.

 

 

With time, she goes hunting again. Her progress it’s even slower and sometimes she worries she’ll never be that good with her bow and arrows again, nor regain the strength she once had. The first time she goes back into the woods she has to ask Thom to take her back to her house and spends the rest of the afternoon retching over her toilet at the memory of the bombing, the ashes and the scattered left behind corpses.

She doesn’t know what to do with her game anymore. The Hob long gone and the people she once knew with it. So she gives it all to Greasy Sae and she cooks for her in return. She doesn’t know what Sae does with the rest of the meat, but Katniss is just glad to get rid of it.

 

Buttercup inexplicably returns. She loses it and turns her house upside down, but, after some broken plates, a lamp and a chair, she sheds silent tears, as she tends the cat the best that she can. They make a truce and keep each other company. It’s not like they are ‘buddies’, but they tolerate each other for their own sake.

 

She hasn’t seen Haymitch since they returned and she supposes she ought to go and visit him, but can’t make herself to go through with it. It would bring memories of _him_ , of everything that happened and how she failed time and time again. Not to mention that Haymitch would see right through her façade. They understand each other too well for her own good.

But every once in a while, she knocks on his door and leaves a squirrel or a rabbit in front of it, before going back to her house. It’s always gone when she comes back out again.

 

She keeps passing _his_ empty house. Each time she goes by it, her heart aches and she feels how it breaks a little more. The windows dark and the chimney without smoke. She wonders why nobody has claimed it yet, since he is never going to return. The other houses in the Victor Village had been filled with families and people who didn’t have a place to live while they rebuilt the District. They lived in a very tight fit, they could really use another house. So why not his?

 

The phone continues ringing and she keeps ignoring it. The same happens with the letters that never cease to come. Until one of her bad days; more like, one of her bad weeks, for how long it lasts. It’s Prim’s birthday.

She locks herself in one of the closets and tries to block out the world, but the phone never stops ringing that day. She feels how her tears start to build up in her eyes and how her body starts shaking. The ring-ring shrilling in her ears, almost like an endless tick-tock. The blankets suffocate her, instead of keeping her safe, they claw at her like the arms of those who never stop calling. She’s breaking down. She knows she is guilty for their deaths; she just wants them to stop accusing her. So she gets angry.

If they ever cared for her why do they keep haunting her?! Why won’t they leave her alone?! She is vaguely aware that someone is screaming ‘shut up’ and she figures it must be her, since she is alone in the house. She feels rage bubbling inside of her, as she gets out of the closet. She keeps mumbling ‘shut up shut up shut up’ under her breath, while she heads to the living room. She takes all of the letters that she has received since coming back, never opened a single one of them, and throws the entire pile to the fireplace and proceeds to light them up. Once the fire has built well enough she goes to the kitchen. She looks for the largest pot she has and fills it to the top with water. Then, careful to not spill any of it, heads to the entrance hallway and throws its contents on the telephone, finally shutting it up.

Silence. She sighs in relief. She blames them; the phone and the letters, the people behind them. It’s their fault that she can’t have peace. They keep nagging at her, never letting her be. They will see now how quickly she’ll recover. It will be easier to forget this way, she says to herself. She isn’t sure who she is trying to convince.

But it doesn’t take her five minutes to miss the annoying ringing and the dusty pile of letters on her living-room table. She is completely alone, just like she wanted, and it couldn’t be any worse. She can’t stand the silence, it’s even worse than the shrilling of the phone, because it means they’re gone. And just like she can’t do anything to fix the drenched device, she can’t wake her loved ones from the dead. And the only one left that isn’t already dead hates her too much to call her, so she figures it didn’t really matter if her phone worked or not. 

That night, when she opens her windows and goes to bed, she childishly wishes _he_ would call her. But then silently cries, as she knows her dream won’t ever come true and it’s useless to keep hoping in vain.

‘Always’ doesn’t exist.

 

 

 

Time continues to pass and she keeps pretending. She’s actually getting good at it. You could almost believe she has healed. Almost.

 

Greasy Sae now comes once or twice a week, leaving her alone the rest of the time. Katniss continues giving her all the game she catches, except for the part that goes to herself and Haymitch.

Haymitch sometimes tags along when Sae goes to her house to cook and they eat their meals in silence; both of them studying each other, scrutinizing how the other one is doing. They don’t talk; the absence of _him_ as a buffer obviously taking its toll.

 

Katniss continues hunting, and regains her strength. When the weather starts heating up, she even goes to the lake and swims. She likes staying underwater holding her breath, ignoring the world out there, pretending she doesn’t exist. How much easier it would be to not exist. She holds her breath thinking ‘what if…’, and considers it for a second, but then comes back out to the surface, suppressing the turmoil inside of her.

 

But most of the time she sings. She sings, because it makes her feel less alone and the lyrics keep her occupied and prevent her from thinking too much when she’s alone. She sings all the songs she knows, as high as she can until her voice starts to fade. She knows everyone in town knows when she sings. The first time she did it she noticed everyone looking at her oddly and only figured why, the second time she did it. Thom told her that, apparently, the mockingjays repeated her songs all the way back to town and that’s how they knew. She frowned in return and started singing only when she was near the lake, but as each time she returned she noticed the looks, she decided to just shrug them off. They all though that she was mad anyways. Maybe she was. She had shot the wrong president, after all. And not even a few weeks back, she had won a fight with the phone… Now that she thought about it, maybe she was worse than it seemed. But what was she supposed to do about it? She didn’t have anyone to help her and, either way, she wasn’t planning on going around and asking someone ‘hey, do you think I’m crazy?’ No way. And if there was no one around to keep her sane and be sane with, why should it bother her she if she was nuts? After all, she was mad alone.

So she decided to label herself as ‘mentally disoriented’ once again. It suited her.

 

 

Did she mention that she had become very good at pretending? Because she really has; no one seems to notice that she finally went insane. And she embraces it. When she is alone, she gives herself freedom to do whatever she feels like at the moment. There’s no one there to judge, so it doesn’t matter anymore.

She sings every day now, sometimes creating her own songs about a ringing phone or a squirrel that wasn’t very fast and ended up with an arrow in her eye… anything that comes to her mind really. But her favorite still remains ‘The Hanging Tree’.

She likes playing ‘Crazy Cat’ with Buttercup. It keeps both of them entertained and she, being crazy herself, makes it all that more fitting. She also invented a new game with him, where they both fight for the thread of wool, as she keeps the yarn suspended over him. Buttercup only wins when she finally gets tired of it and gives the entire ball to him.

 

 

 

She knows she looks different than when she just remained sat in her rocking chair all those months ago. You could even call her ‘normal’. Her hair is longer now, she has noticed how her scars have faded a bit and her skin has turned a few shades darker, spending a lot of her time in the woods. She isn’t so skinny anymore either, though she still is underweight, and her body had regained its muscle. Sure, she goes out now, she hunts, she takes care of herself and she actually exchanges a few words with Greasy Sae sometimes. But that doesn’t mean she feels any better. Even though on the outside she looks like a complete different person, she still feels like she is drowning, memories haunting her and she wonders why the hell she is still alive.

The only real difference is that she has learned how to bluff and hide the truth.

And as she keeps on faking, the days keep on passing by, turning into weeks and weeks turning into months. And suddenly is summer once again and Reaping day is only around the corner.

And she tries, she really tries, but she shuts down again. Sae notices this immediately, but lets her be, understanding in her eyes. She visits her the entire week, always bringing food with her and staying until Katniss eats it.

 

 

It’s the day prior to the Reaping, when Greasy Sae comes inside her house, sporting a wide smile in her face. “Girl, I have wonderful news for you!” Katniss’ head angles to the side at this, what in earth could those be? “But I’m not ruining the surprise, you’ll have to wait for the repeat tonight!”

She furrows her brows. Why tell her she has news (wonderful that is) if she’s not going to share them? But she has to admit it, her curiosity has perked up. So, she half-heartedly hears Sae talking, telling her all about this not only ‘wonderful’, but also ‘excellent’ and ‘very good’ news. It’s needless to say, that she never once reveals exactly what they are.

 

That night, Katniss sits in her rocking chair, unsure about whether or not to listen to Sae and watch the repeat of the ‘wonderful news’ at nine. As the hour fast approaches, she thinks about all the pros and cons, afraid of turning on the TV for what it might show her, or leaving it off and missing a really good announcement…

Four minutes after nine, she finds herself sitting on the couch, the control remote in her hand, pressing the red button and watching as the TV comes to life. Her eyes widen and she faintly hears herself gasp. _He_ is on screen.

Peeta.

 

After her first shock subsides, she processes the whole image and her heart sinks. He is not alone. In fact, the very beautiful Delly Carwright clings to his arm as he talks to the interviewer. In the background, she can discern that they are in a Capitol party. And he smiles. And Delly smiles along, both of her hands holding to his left arm. And he talks about how well Panem seems to have got back on its feet and how much it has improved. He includes himself in that statement. And he is in a tuxedo and he looks as handsome as ever. And Katniss can’t hear what he is saying anymore, because when he smiles again she notices how clear his eyes seem and how much like his old self he looks; it’s as if he was never hijacked.

And she is happy, she is honestly happy for him, because it’s as if she had never crossed his path and ruined him how she did. He deserves a girl as bubbly and pretty as Delly; he deserves a happy and free-of-Katniss life and more. But, at the same time, it hurts, it hurts so bad, because it was easier when he hated her thinking she was a mutt, but now… Now he sees her for who she really is and made the decision to stay away from her with a clear mind.

And she can’t help resenting him, for moving on so easily, so fast. Without her. She resents him for leaving her behind without a word. It hurts inside when Delly says something about District 12 and his smile turns even brighter at her words. And she resents him the most, as she feels how her heart breaks.

What little was left of her after the war ended was his, even though he didn’t know it. Hell, even if she herself didn’t know it. And he crushed it, the last piece of her heart that she had left.

 

Warm tears were running down her cheeks when she finally managed to make herself turn off the TV. She regretted ever turning it on. It didn’t matter that the screen was now black; she could still see him in her mind, looking as if nothing ever happened. Delly Cartwright clinging to his arm. It seemed everything and everyone was like that now, all better, and she had been left behind, forgotten in a house full of ghosts and a mind full of nightmares. Eternally haunted.

And eternally shattered, unable to pick up the pieces, because the pieces had been lost in games and war, so what were they for if they didn’t fit together anymore? Why isn’t she dead? She was just another ghost anyways, what was the difference?

She should have left the TV off; she shouldn’t have listened to Sae.

 

But as they say, curiosity killed the Kat.

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it has taken me ages to update and I'm sorry for the long wait, but I did warned you... I just didn't know how I wanted to end the story, still don't really, and now I'm thinking about doing it 4 chapters long, when originally there were only going to be 2, so you get my point. I keep changing the plot in my head over and over again.
> 
> I don't have a beta and english isn't my native language, so I'm sorry for any mistakes you might find.
> 
>    
> Hope you like it! Please leave a review  
> Thank you for reading! :)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> I do not know The Hunger Games.

Peeta arrives back to District Twelve on Reaping Day, which, oddly, is also the anniversary of the last time he was there. He looks along the train station, but sees no one there to receive him, not that there should be, no family left, Haymitch probably sleeping off the alcohol and Katniss...

With a sigh, he turns around and feels something between longing and jealousy when he sees that Delly already found her little brother and are hugging tightly, making him even more aware of his own lonesomeness.

After some greetings, they all walk towards Town, bags in their hands, and make idle chit-chat with Delly’s brother about the reconstruction in Twelve and who has returned so far. The Hob and most of the business buildings are now standing once again, but there aren’t many houses yet. Delly’s brother, for instance, is still living in one of the houses in Victor’s Village, along with two other families, so Peeta invites him and Delly to stay at his house from now on.

 

 

Once they’ve all settled in and Peeta has showed Delly and her brother the house and their rooms, he leaves them and goes visit Haymitch.

When he enters his mentor’s house, he isn’t surprised by the foul smell or the poor state of the house and its furniture. What does surprise him, is finding Haymitch awake and considerably sober, and not only that, but that he is tending geese.

They talk empty words, much like he had done earlier with Delly and her brother, they stick to safe topics like the weather and Greasy Sae cooking for him every once in a while. Until Haymitch gets tired of him trying to make indirect questions about Katniss, but never straight forward asking about her.

“Make a decision boy, you gonna ask what you came here to ask or not?”

Peeta is taken off guard, but is part of why he had come to visit Haymitch first, so he finally asks the question. “How is she?”

“Better,” Haymitch grunts, but follows that with incoherent mumbling about _pretending_ and _lies_. Peeta realizes that ‘better’ doesn’t necessarily mean ‘well’, since the last time he saw her was when she had shoot Coin instead of Snow and had later tried to swallow the Nightlock pill, so really almost anything could be better than that.

 

 

He leaves the mentor’s house and walks up to Katniss’ front porch, but can’t make himself knock on the door. He feels self-conscious standing there, not knowing how she’ll react, for once not knowing what to say. So he decides that he could follow her example and speak though actions instead of words and heads to the woods in search of some evening Primroses.

 

 

He comes back with a shovel and the flowers and proceeds to plant them along the front of her house. But she never comes outside, even though he knows she must have heard him with all the noise he’s making. He leaves her house without having seen her, ‘maybe she wasn’t ready to see me…’ he thinks. And another thought follows that first one, a sadder one, that maybe she just didn’t _want_  to see him. But in true Peeta form, hope comes right back and tells him that maybe she wasn’t at home and that he should try again tomorrow.

 

 

Peeta goes back the next day, bread in hand, but no one answers the door. And the day after that one he goes back twice, each time knocking and then waiting patiently for her to open up, but again, there’s no response. The third day he’s pounding his fist against the wood, tired of being ignored and shouting to the house in an attempt to get her attention, after everything they’ve been through together he at least deserves to be acknowledge, in any form it may be, but still… no reply.

So, instead, he goes over to Haymitch, for whatever piece of information he may get. He walks right inside his mentor’s house and finds him sitting at the kitchen table, nursing a drink. “Finished yelling at sweetheart’s house?”

Peeta huffs, exasperated, but also kind of embarrassed for his reaction, since probably everybody that is now living in Victor’s Village heard him. “I know I came back almost a year later than I should have, but that’s not good enough of a reason to ignore me like she’s doing…”

Haymitch stares at him silently, clearly amused, as he vents away. “And it’s not like I was at the Capitol for the pleasure and the ‘good old memories’, I was there for therapy, for fucks’ sake! To be able to approach her without running the risk of killing her!”

“It’s good to see you back,” His mentor interrupts his rant.

“Haymitch I’ve been back for days, you already saw me!”

“I wasn’t talking about that, I meant….” He makes a gesture with his hand pointing all of Peeta. “…you.”

“Oh. Yeah… sappy old Peeta is back.” He sighs, feeling as he just got out of the train after his first Games. “I thought we had gotten over this part, but guess we’re right back to square one.”

“No need to sound so bitter boy, it doesn’t go well with you… Just give her time; I’m not even sure she knew you were coming back.”

 

 

The next morning he heads to her house once again, having decided that he’ll visit her until she opens her door. He won’t shout for her to open up, but that doesn’t mean that he’ll stop trying. He has a bag in his hand filled with a dozen cheese buns still warm inside, hoping that maybe the smell of food will lure her out of her lair.

Almost there, he comes across Greasy Sae leaving Katniss’ porch. “Hello Sae, how are you?”

“Hello, oh, I’m alright, thank you…” The old woman studies him for a second. “You goin’ see the girl?”

Peeta simply nods, trying to avoid having to explain the real complexity of the situation, since he’s not sure if he’ll actually see her.

“Good, then you could make sure that she eats all the food I left at her door… We don’t want her skinnier than she is.”

“She… Um, you didn’t see her?” Is she avoiding everyone now?

“No, she wouldn’t open up.” At seeing Peeta’s expression on his face she adds, “Oh boy, I’m sure it’s nothing, she’s just having one of her bad days… Let’s not forget it was the Reaping’s anniversary just a few days ago.”

“Sae when… when was the last time you saw her?” He asks slowly, scared to hear the answer that he may get.

“The day just before the Reaping… Why?” Peeta’s eyes go from Sae, to Katniss’ house and then to Haymitch’s, trying to stay calm, but it’s been five days since Greasy Sae last saw Katniss and he can’t recall Haymitch mentioning that he had seen her either.  “I need you to go fetch Haymitch right now, Sae. Please hurry.”

Peeta rushes towards the door that has been taunting him these past few days, but now dreading what he may find on the other side of it once it’s open. Without stopping to think for a better plan, he picks a stone from the ground and throws it at the window, effectively breaking the glass. He covers his arm with his sleeve and tries to remove what is left of the glass the best he can. In his hurry, he loses patience and quickly proceeds to just go through the window, not really feeling the cuts he gets in the rush of adrenaline. Finally inside, he starts running from room to room, shouting Katniss’ name at the top of his lungs, opening every door he comes across. He goes to the second floor, getting more desperate by the second that passes without a response. He’s inside her room, the only place left in the house that he hasn’t looked in yet is her closet and he is one door away from what he might find on the other side. “Please,” he whispers; please don’t let this be a nightmare come true; please don’t let this be real.

He turns the knob and pushes the door open, but just as the rest of the house, he finds it empty. He hesitates for a second in front of the closet, not sure what to make of the deserted house; is it something good? But then he springs back into action and decides that his next move is to interrogate Haymitch.

He turns around, and finds that his mentor is already there, one hand holding to the door frame, his breathing just as hard as his own. “When was the last time that you saw her?”

Haymitch stares at the floor, thinking to himself. It’s clear that he can’t remember, probably too drunk to keep track of the days. “ _When_ was it?” Peeta grunts between his teeth.

The old man just shakes his head and grumbles, as if speaking to himself, “Some days ago”.

“Really, Haymitch? ‘ _Some_ days ago’? That’s the best you got?!” Peeta scoffs, getting angrier by the second. “YOU WERE SUPPOUSED TO KEEP AN EYE ON HER!”

Haymitch stays silent for a second, just like a child being reprimanded and knowing that he did wrong, but still trying to figure a way out. Ironically, he looks as he had suddenly aged ten years, all of the creases and lines present on his face, marking how life has taken its toll on him. “Maybe we should wait and see if Sweetheart returns, she’s probably hunting…”

“FOR _FIVE_  DAYS?!” Peeta can’t hold back anymore, his mentor’s cynicism unbearable. He crosses the room in a few long strides and punches Haymitch right in the face with all his strength. Haymitch stumbles back, but manages to grab a hold to the door frame once again and steady himself. His eyes are wide open, but Peeta doesn’t understand how he could possibly be shocked; he must have seen that one coming, he deserved it and from how he’s not fighting back it’s clear that he agrees with him.

 

 

After searching through the entire house two more times and turning it upside down, Peeta settles himself outside, in her front porch, to wait. Too late in the day to go venture the woods alone. He’ll give her until tomorrow, and if she’s not back by then he’ll go find her.

So he waits. And waits. And continues waiting. He watches the sun go down, memories flooding his mind from when they watched it together in what they thought was their last day of peace before of the Quell; but in reality it was a last day to so much more. He still wishes he could have stopped time back then and lived in that moment forever, with her in his arms and the color of sunset surrounding them, the last moment of peace that he remembers. And the easy feeling of infinite love for her.

Everything was so complicated now. Too much had happened between now and then. The Quell, being separated, the war, the high-jacking, their last mission in the Capitol, Prim’s death, the president’s assassination, being separated again. It felt as if a lifetime had gone by, but he still…  He didn’t know what to call it or if it was a ‘still’ or an ‘again’ more kind of thing, but the point was that he _does_ feel something for her.

The sun went down and was soon followed by darkness, but he remained sited there, thankful that it’s summer so that it’s not very cold outside. He doesn’t sleep, but it feels like he does, because it seems as if he’s trapped inside one of his nightmares where she’s gone missing and never to return again. The worst part is that he can’t wake up from it.

At what must be three a.m. Haymitch comes out of his house and approaches him. “You go to sleep now; I’ll take the guard from here”.

“No. How am I supposed to trust you’ll actually stay awake?” Peeta grumbles, even though he knows his watch is pointless, because if she hasn’t returned already it’s most probable that she won’t for the rest of the night.

His mentor sits down next to him before replying. “Because you don’t have another choice. You’ll need your energy tomorrow if you’re planning to go searching for her.”

Peeta just nods. He knows he is right, but that doesn’t mean he likes it. “Fine,” he huffs, “but I’ll sleep here.” And after moving to the ground and laying down he adds, “Not that I’ll be able to anyway.”

 

 

The first hints of the sun start appearing in the sky, slowly spreading. After what must have been one, wishfully two, hours of sleep, Peeta decides there’s enough light and moves to start his day and his search.

He goes back inside her house; this time looking for things that are missing that could give him any sort of clue. Or more likely, prove his suspicions, since there aren’t many places where Katniss Everdeen would like to go to.  He doesn’t remember everything about her anymore, as he once told her, but he does remember that she doesn’t like change, she doesn’t like going out of her comfort-zone. So really, there’s only one place that she would go to. The forest.

He doesn’t even have to rummage that much, after one look in her bedroom he quickly confirms what his intuition had been telling him. He can’t find her father’s hunting jacket and at first he thinks she must have gotten hurt while she was hunting. But then he notices the absence of the plant book they had once worked together at. And that second item is what sets a feeling of dread inside of him, because the absence of that particular object speaks volumes. It means she didn’t go for a while to the woods; she knows the plants like the back of her hand. She would only need the plant book in case she forgot something… in time.

He isn’t sure if she ever planned to come back…

 

 

By the time he goes back to his house the sun is completely out. He fills a bag with food, water, matches, a lantern, two knives and a blanket. And somewhere in the study he finds a compass that he doesn’t really know why it’s there, no need to know in which direction is north, when you can’t go anywhere. But he stuffs it in his pocket none the less.

He only stops for a second to ask Delly to keep an eye on Katniss’ house and see if she returns, to which she accepts in earnest. Not that he really thinks that she’ll return. But you have to stay positive, right?

 

 

At first, he starts heading directly to the woods, but then he realizes he wouldn’t know where to go once he reached the trees… how to search for her. So he makes a stop in town and approaches a man that’s painting a house recently finished. Peeta asks him where he can find Thom and the man points to a larger building, still in construction, where he can see Thom going inside, carrying a box of tools over his shoulder.

Peeta jogs over and calls Thom’s name. The man turns around and waits for him.

“Hi,” Peeta breaths. Thom manages a ‘hi’ that’s immediately cut by Peeta, “I would ask you how you’ve been, but I need to ask you a favor and I’m kind of in a hurry.”

Thom raises his eyebrows and lowers his box of tools to the ground, making clear he has his full attention. “What can I help you with?”

Peeta goes straight to the point and tells him he needs his help to organize a search party.

“What happened? For whom!?” Thom’s eyes widen in alarm.

“Katniss’ missing.”

“Katniss?” Thom repeats, his brows furrow, like he’s trying to figure something out. “But…”

“What?” Peeta exclaims, being ruder than needed, but he’s thirsty for any information he may get and doesn’t have much patience at the moment, barely having slept last night.

“I don’t think you need a search party,” Thom says calmly. “She’s in the woods.”

“I know she’s in the woods,” Peeta’s voice dripping with exasperation, “That doesn’t mean I can find her by my own!” The forest is _huge_ ; hell, he doesn’t even know where, if, it ends; what is Thom thinking?

“You know how I know she’s there?” Thom asks patiently. Peeta shakes his head, at a loss. “Because I hear the mockingjays sing… Because _she_ ’s singing.” Peeta’s eyes widen in surprise, his heart beating faster. “You just have to follow the tune to where it gets louder.”

“Thank you.” His hope has been renewed and his heart is beating wildly now, energy running through his veins. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Without waiting for an answer, Peeta dashes towards the forest and doesn’t stop until he’s forced to when he reaches the fence. He steps over a part of it that is precariously still standing, a few of the wires tied to some sticks someone buried in the ground, but the higher wires are all cut so that it isn’t very tall.

Once on the other side, he stands still and listens for a moment, trying to catch any melody of some sort.

And he does.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I said in the note at the beginning, I still haven't decided how to end the story and I keep changing the plot... So, I can't say when I'll update next part. Sorry :/
> 
>  
> 
> tumblr: thestuckinbed

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Leave me your thoughts about it :)
> 
>  
> 
> tumblr: thestuckinbed


End file.
